6 Reasons Why Women Need To Lift Weights

6 Reasons Why Women Need To Lift Weights

There are many reasons why women need to lift weights and we will share our 6 reasons in this post. And, No. You will not magically wake up one day and look like one of those juiced out bodybuilders on the front of muscle magazines. Luckily, the “I just don’t want to get too bulky” argument from women in regards to lifting weights is slowly going to the wayside.

Maybe it is the droves of scientific information that proves the difference between a woman and a man’s hormonal milieu makes it nearly impossible for the vast majority of females to elicit the same gains as males from a lifting protocol.

Maybe it is the surge in CrossFit™ popularity that is exposing many women, which would not have otherwise even tried it, to the positive benefits of weightlifting.

I am not sure what it is, but I am glad the paradigm is shifting. Hopefully, this list will help those women still on the fence about whether or not to make the jump into a program realize that lifting weights definitely help to reach your goals. And if you still have the question, why should I lift weights then these reasons may help you decide.

6 benefits of weight lifting for women:

Long Term Bone Health

Calorie Burning

Thyroid Issues

Confidence

Prevent Boredom

Lifting Weights, It’s Just Plain Cool

It’s a pretty well-established fact that women have much higher odds of bone deterioration later in life. The medicines that exist now to treat it are effective in slowing the progress of such conditions. Yet, there may be a way to prevent or lessen such issues altogether. There is a principle of biomechanics called Wolff’s Law.

Wolff’s Law states that applying a bending force (i.e. muscle contraction of physical load) on a bone stimulates the bone remodeling process causing the bone to grow thicker and stronger over time to adapt to the stress. Think about that. It is literally the polar opposite of a bone wasting condition. So, if you have a family history of osteoporosis or are at risk yourself, you really should begin properly lifting weights to take advantage of this phenomena.

Women who lift weights don’t deal with the issues of long slow cardio

There are some issues that go along with the typical long duration slow steady state cardio most women default to when they chose to start exercising. Mainly, the only way to improve on the calorie burning benefits of long cardio sessions is to either make them longer or do them more frequently. This is because of deeply inlaid survival mechanisms that have evolved that actually causes or resting metabolic rate to slow down (i.e. we burn fewer calories at rest to store more energy for longer cardio sessions) once exercise has ceased. High-intensity activity and weightlifting elicit a response called EPOC (excess post-exercise oxygen consumption).

EPOC happens because of the high anaerobic state of intense exercise. Basically, oxygen gets squeezed out of the muscle and it takes 24-36 hours to replenish that lost 02. During that time period, resting metabolic rate is drastically increased. *This EPOC principle is not the end all be all of the efficient calorie burnings. Of course, everyone needs a base of aerobic fitness that should constantly be maintained throughout life. The increase in Resting Metabolic Rate after intense exercise is just too significant to be ignored.

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Although the research is still a little spotty, it is worth mentioning that using cardio as a primary form of exercise may have some negative effect on the thyroid in women. Most likely, due to the energy conservation phenomena I mentioned above. The metabolic regulatory properties of the thyroid appear to chronically slow down. Again, this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t ever do cardio, it just shouldn’t be the primary form of exercise.

There are very few things in life that mimic the feeling of absolutely crushing a new personal record on a free weight lift. The ability to quantify and see increases in your physical strength will definitely transfer over to your confidence. In my opinion, it will also help with your overall positive psychological state. Think of it this way, once you’ve reached some incredible milestone like a 300 lb deadlift, how on earth could anything in real life “weigh you down?”

Why women need to lift weights?

Long Slow Cardio Training is boring. There is barely any variation outside of just using a different machine or changing up your time/intervals. With weightlifting, you are basically only limited by your imagination. With the many variations, you can utilize to continue your progress. Also, staleness is the death of consistency. Anything you can do to keep your training fresh will ensure a much higher level of adherence for the long term.

Lifting Weights Is Just Plain Cool! If the above is not enough to convince you, this might. Weight lifting is just plain cool. You will look totally hot sweating over iron next to the muscle dudes at the gym, all day and every day!

Have we missed any reasons why women need to lift weights?

It would be great for you to share your best ideas on why women need to lift weights in the comments below.

If you now realize why women need to lift weights and yet you are unsure where to begin we suggest the following workouts for women:

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